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Are you annoyed by the long chain of e-mail messages in your inbox each morning? Do you wish you could speak to your co-workers in person instead of over Skype? It's not just you. Many employees lament that new technologies have eradicated most of the face-to-face work of the business world.

Tablets are hot, and the market for these mobile devices is a crowded one. Ethan Gach, a columnist for Forbes, recently wrote that Walmart alone sold more than 1.4 million tablets during its November Black Friday sales event. But retailers are not the only ones profiting from the tablet boom: As Gach writes, so are comic publishers.

How much privacy do you expect when shopping for a winter coat at your local department store? What about when you're browsing the shops at the nearest indoor mall? Well, you shouldn't expect much. New technology is rendering it ever easier for retailers to snoop on the products you buy and the path you take through a store or mall.

Ever get the urge to call your boss while you're showering? Ever need to talk to your significant other and keep shoveling snow while doing so? You're in luck: Manufacturers have created two new tech gadgets which give you the ability to tackle these dubious tasks.

No one could argue that Samsung isn't a leading force in the smartphone and tablet industry. Consumers are flocking to these devices. But the word "consumers" is the key in that last sentence. In spite of Samsung's successfulness in selling tablets and smartphones to consumers, it still has a lot of work to do to draw business leaders to purchase its phones.

It should have come as little surprise to find the federal government's Healthcare.gov website was riddled with problems. Let's be honest, the us government has track record that is utterly dreadful regarding high-tech projects.

A dismal history

The Los Angeles Times recently published an interesting story about the long history of government tech failures.

InformationWeek columnist Kevin Coleman has some not so good news for us: The United States is slowly falling from its perch as the globe’s technology and science leader. Instead, Coleman writes, the country is gradually - but steadily - becoming a technology laggard.

Whenever a new technology debuts -- whether it's a new solution to connect with family and friends or a way to make cars get better mileage -- we get psyched up. We wonder how this tech can change our lives and the world. Inevitably, though, the same thing happens: This new technology has its niche, but it doesn't alter the world significantly.

Does investing in a Chromebook make financial sense? To this point, consumers haven't flocked to the system. And ZDNet writer Larry Seltzer states that there's a valid reason for this: Buying a Chromebook just doesn't make financial sense.

Struggling

Sales on Chromebooks have been extremely sluggish thus far.

Crowdfunding is incredibly hot. We like the concept of getting a bunch of people together, having them all make small donations and fund beneficial projects. But can this funding model work for something really big? Something like the private space race? It's a question asked in a recent PCMag story.